Wafer handling apparatus are generally utilized to transfer wafers from one transporting vehicle to another. These transporting vehicles are normally referred to as "boats". Each of these boats, when loaded, provides a predetermined spacing for the wafers. The wafers are typically transferred from the moving boat to a quartz boat, the quartz boat utilized to hold the wafers for processing. When moving wafers from one location to another, it is only necessary to retain the wafers in such as manner that they do not touch each other so as not to scratch or in any way damage the surface of the wafers. The wafer handling apparatus is operable to transfer the wafers from the moving boat to the quartz boat for processing thereof and back to the moving boat after processing.
During processing, it is sometime desirable to vary the wafer spacing to allow for a more even processing over the surface of the wafer. However, it is still desirable to minimize the distance between the wafers to allow the maximum number of wafers to be placed into the processing environment. With present systems, predetermined wafer spacings are provided and the only way to increase this wafer spacing is to incrementally increase the spacing, i.e., spaced every retaining slot, every other retaining slot, every third retaining slot, etc. There is no provision at present to accommodate spacing distances that are fractions of the spacing in the boat that holds the wafers, which spacing is conventional.